Busy day at the polls: Missing judges, ballot confusion, steady lines of voters

Polls officially opened at 7 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2014, for Illinois voters to settle a close, contentious race for governor and decide an unusually large number of ballot questions as well as races for the U.S. Senate and House, the General Assembly and county board.

Illinois voters headed to the polls Tuesday to settle a close, contentious race for governor and decide an unusually large number of ballot questions as well as races for U.S. Senate and House, the General Assembly and the County Board.

Missing election judges, confusion over lengthy ballots and fights over election code interpretations complicated Election Day for voters from the South Side of Chicago to Lake County.

Attorney General Lisa Madigan obtained a midday court order from a local judge to force a change in the procedures Lake County officials were using to deal with prospective voters who came to the polls Tuesday but had previously requested a mail-in ballot.

With local polling places open from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m., a record number of Chicago and suburban Cook County voters already had taken advantage of early voting opportunities in a non-presidential election year — potentially putting a greater onus on Republicans to turn out their voters on Election Day.

Nearly 242,000 voters cast early ballots in person in the city and suburban Cook since Oct. 20, up from the nearly 170,000 votes cast in the last governor election in 2010. In addition, the number of mail-in ballots in the city and county jumped from nearly 49,000 four years ago to at least 66,174 this time out, with more to be counted. Election authorities in most of the collar counties also reported increases in early and absentee voting.

Langdon Neal, chairman of the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners, said the early voting numbers could mean a better turnout for this election than four years ago.

"We did 53 percent four years ago. Early voting is up 33 percent this election," Neal said Tuesday morning at a polling place at an American Legion post in Lincoln Park. "I hope it's a trend so we will surpass where we were four years ago. But we don't know whether these are reliable voters who made up their mind early or this is an indication of strong numbers. The day will tell, but judging from this polling place this morning, there appears to be a lot of interest."

One of the voters there, Ashley Fruendt, said all the coverage generated by the governor's race had raised her awareness of other issues on the ballot.

"I think the biggest reason I came out is because I feel a civic duty to do it," she said. "My parents are both teachers, so the issue of pensions is big for me."

At a normally slow precinct on North Marine Drive in Chicago's Margate Park, a steady stream of voters cast ballots early Tuesday, with some voters taking up to 20 minutes to make their way through the long ballot.

There were 35 people voting within an hour of the polls opening, according to longtime election judge Phil Arendt. He gauged the turnout at his precinct as a little heavier than the last midterm elections.

Many of the voters said they had made up their minds long before Tuesday, and the constant barrage of advertisements by gubernatorial candidates had little, if any, impact on their decision. Instead, they said, they cast their votes based on the issues that were most important to them.

Maria Mondragon, 49, had a long list of things she considered. Among them were a minimum wage increase, the environment, social service safety nets and gun control.

“I think working people need someone to represent us and make good decisions in our favor,” said Mondragon, who lives in a high-rise building along the lakefront. “There’s too much power at the top with very little power given to regular people.”

The midterm elections, she said, are too important to ignore because they give people a voice.

As a longtime Illinois state employee, Hector Diaz, 48, had a specific issue in mind when he cast his ballot for governor: pension reform.

“Each of the candidates have their own idea in terms of changing the pension and retirement benefits, and those are issues that are important to me,” he said. “I have to think about who can best bring the reforms that will benefit me.”

Lake County fight

In the Republican stronghold of Lake County, Clerk Willard Helander complained that Democratic poll watchers descended on polling places to question the way election judges hired by the clerk were doing their job.

“I have had it, I really have,” Helander, a Republican who is retiring after holding the office for two decades, said by telephone. “I have been getting complaints from all over the county from election judges whose every action is being questioned.”

The attorney general went to court to contest the clerk’s interpretation of an election code provision for people who request a mail-in ballot but show up to vote on Election Day saying they never received that ballot. The clerk had advised judges to require such voters to cast a provisional ballot, which would only count after they determined no mail-in ballot had been cast. But Madigan’s office argued successfully in court that voters could cast a regular ballot as long as they filed an affidavit attesting that they never received the mail-in ballot.

Madigan’s office also got the judge to require Lake County officials to keep open until 9 p.m. several sites operating under new provisions that allow voters to both register and vote on Election Day, after complaints that those sites weren’t open at 6 a.m. as required.

“The Lake County Clerk is failing to follow the law,” Madigan said in a news release. “These illegal practices risk disenfranchising voters throughout the county.”

Helander defended her office’s interpretation of the mail-in ballot rules and said she was concerned the ruling barring the use of provisional ballots in those cases could open up the possibility of voter fraud by creating the potential that people could vote twice -- by mail and in person. Helander said her directions on the mail-in matter are not new and could have been settled before Election Day, alleging it was part of “Chicago-style” political maneuvering.

There is a history of tension between longtime Republican county officials and Democrats who control state government and rely on support from Democratic voting blocs in Waukegan and North Chicago.

“I don’t know how this will work out, but I can tell you I am glad that I am retiring,” Helander said.

Through a spokeswoman, Madigan’s office said it has worked continuously to persuade Helander to alter her requirements on provisional ballots since complaints first began to emerge in the 2010 election and again in 2012.

“Then we started hearing complaints again this year during early voting,” said Madigan spokeswoman Natalie Bauer. “We spoke multiple times to the (Lake County) state's attorney's office, including as late as this morning.”

Ken Menzel, deputy general counsel for the Illinois State Board of Elections, agreed that the law favors Madigan’s position but questioned the assertion that requiring a provisional ballot constitutes disenfranchisement of voters.

“In any event, if you have a voter cast a provisional ballot you are not being disenfranchised, that vote is as valid as any other vote,” Menzel said.

One Lake County poll supervisor who works for the clerk’s office said his judges were requiring provisional ballots until he got a call from Madigan’s office about 4:30 p.m.

"There's really no issue. (Provisional ballots) are valid votes," said Kipp Wilson, a site supervisor at a polling place in the Highland Park Police Department. "People just don't understand what a provisional ballot is. Honestly, it's not going to make much difference in the long run.”

Chicago judges missing

The opening of some polling places was complicated because as many as 200 election judges did not show up Tuesday morning, an unusually high number, according to Neal.

All available backup judges were moved into place, though, and in some cases voters were sworn in as judges so that polling places could open. Some polling places didn't open on time at 6 a.m. because of the glitches, but all city polling locations were open by 7 a.m., said Chicago election board spokesman Jim Allen.

A few hundred voters were inconvenienced, Allen said, and the board is prepared to keep some polling places open late if voters were not able to cast ballots.

Neal said the number of no-show judges is usually fewer than 50, and he attributed the higher number to what he has described as malicious automated phone calls that went out over the weekend to some judges, falsely informing them they needed more training in order to qualify to work on Tuesday. Neal said officials are trying to determine who is responsible for the calls.

One polling place in the 49th Ward, Leona's restaurant, didn't open until 8:15 because judges could not get the doors open, Neal said. Another polling place in the 42nd Ward opened more than an hour late because all five judges didn't show.

Neal said: "Most of the late openings were because only one or two judges showed up and they simply couldn't get everything done in time, it was a serious issue for us this morning."

He expects that a "handful" of polling places will have to remain open late to accommodate about 100 voters who showed up to vote in the morning but could not wait and left.

"We are contacting all those voters by phone now to see what accommodations can be made," Neal said.

Records show that in several cases around the city, voters were sworn in as judges on the spot to help out.

Neal said that despite a few late openings, elections officials were able to adjust and deploy more than 200 standby judges to fill in. "It is the first time we have ever had to use all of them," he said. "We are out."

Even when judges did show up, there was confusion over ballots at some polling places.

There were more than two dozen complaints in Chicago involving election judges during morning voting who handed out the first half of the paper ballot but did not give out the second page that contained referendum questions including proposed amendments to the state constitution.

In some cases, voters discovered after they voted that they had not had a chance to vote on the referendum and constitutional amendment questions, according to complaints filed with city election authorities. In other cases, voters caught the problem when judges didn’t hand them the full ballot.

At least some judges were unaware they even had the second pages of the ballots and had to be directed by supervisors at election headquarters to retrieve them and hand them out.

According to one such complaint from a West Side polling place, the 41st voter of the day called into to election headquarters to report that no constitutional ballots had been distributed. "Voter said she went to the polling place at 7 am and did not receive a CON ballot," the complaint read. "She even asked the judge at station two about it and that judge claimed ignorance."

City election board spokesman Jim Allen said judges were told they had to hand out both pages of the ballot.

“The bottom line is that we should be able to have a one-page ballot. ... This ballot is really, really long,” Allen said. “It's a burden for our judges, and quite honestly it's a burden for our voters, too, who have to take extra time to cast their ballots.

"Once you've left the polling place, there's no going back to the polling place and saying, 'Oh, there was a part of my ballot that I did not vote.' That's the unfortunate truth," Allen said.

Neal said his office referred the matter to Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez. The prosecutor’s office did not return calls for comment this afternoon.

"This had the net effect of affecting people's right to vote,” Allen said. “This one is a new, dirty trick."

"The board wants to pursue an investigation,” he said. “If the state's attorney doesn't want to do it, we'll take it up to higher authorities who will. And if there are higher authorities that don't want to take on this case, we'll look at other options including litigation."

Election authorities got a court order to keep six precincts at four Chicago polling places open until 8 p.m. to accommodate the morning delays in opening; some of those delays were from a lack of judges.

Registration issues

At the city and Cook County election headquarters at 69 W. Washington St., there was more than an hour wait at 10 a.m. with more than 100 people in a line snaking through the basement, waiting for the chance to register and vote under so-called grace period rules that cover those who were not registered prior to Election Day.

People who haven't registered to vote yet but have been living in their precincts for at least 30 days can bring two forms of identification, one of which must include current address. Such ballots will be considered "provisional" and set aside from the regular vote count until the registration information provided by the new voter can be authenticated.

But same-day registration is not available at every polling place, which could lead to confusion for some voters. In suburban Cook, there are fewer than two dozen same-day registration locations. Election authorities in each county have same-day registration locations posted on their websites.

The effort to get voters to polling places came against the backdrop of a sea of politicians who drifted across the state on the eve of Election Day, urging supporters to make sure they cast a ballot and making a late-hour pitch for the backing of the undecided.

At the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center in Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood, dozens of residents lined up early Tuesday to register, change their addresses and vote.

And although it was a lengthy, five-step process just to get to the voting booth, residents waited, rocking back and forth as they stood, chatting it up and playing games on their cellphones.

It took Twyla Speed, 38, nearly two hours to cast a ballot, she said. A new resident of Bronzeville, she said she reported to her local polling place at 6:30 a.m. and was told she wasn't registered and had to then travel to the King Center to start over.

"I'm really disappointed," Speed said. "I purchased my home in May. When I went to the department of motor vehicles, I had my address and everything switched over. Then this morning, I'm not registered. How did this happen? No one is sure. I just hope this isn't another way to manipulate voters."

With a stack of mail in hand and several forms of identification, Speed tolerated the long line. But she wasn't certain many people would be as determined as she was Tuesday.

"Your job is supposed to give you time to vote, but when it takes this long, it's scary," she said. "You walk into the office late, and you just don't want it to go on your record or hurt your job because you were voting.

"I thought this was taken care of. Then my registration isn't in the system. I can't help but wonder: Did somebody drop the ball?"

At the King Center, only one election judge failed to show, officials said. There were only four voting booths because officials didn't expect the flood of residents.

To get to the booth, the voters had to stand in a line that wrapped through the hallway in the basement of the building. Once inside the polling place, voters got a seat to wait some more. Then they filled out paperwork, showed proof of their address and had their registration verified through computer files manned by only two people. After those four steps, they finally made it to the voting booth where they faced a 17-page ballot.

"It goes pretty smoothly, but it takes a long time," said Kevin Laurent, 57, who ended up at the center after failing to change his address earlier this year. "If they had more people working here, it could speed up the process a bit. I would have been mad if I wasn't able to vote today."

Arlene Marshall moved into a new home in Englewood two months ago, she said. She changed her address and got the utilities going. But in all her transferring, she forgot to check on her voter's registration, she said.

"I didn't even think about it until this weekend," she said. "I realized I never got a new registration card. I called the Board of Elections yesterday, and they referred me to this location."

As she sat in line, Marshall, 58, coached herself to be patient.

"I'm grateful for the opportunity to vote, because I didn't want to miss this election," she said. "It's a great idea, to have same-day registration offered. It turned out to be needed, not just for me but for a lot of people.

"This won't be me the next election."

Ald. Jason Ervin, 28th, was on the phone in the lobby of the West Side Learning Center, making calls to help a young woman from his ward find her proper precinct after she was unable to vote at the Madison Street location.

Because the West Side Learning Center was an early voting center for the area, as well as an Election Day registration polling place, Ervin said there was some confusion among voters thinking they could still vote there.

"There are a lot of moving parts here," he said.

There were two lines at the polling place: one to register and one to vote. Ervin said the registration line was longer, but neither appeared to be discouraging voters. One man at the head of the registration line that was about a dozen people long said he had been waiting only about 15 minutes.

On the ballot

Much of the attention was focused on the tight race between Democratic Gov. Pat Quinn, who is seeking a second elected term, and Republican challenger Bruce Rauner, a first-time candidate. The two candidates have reported raising a combined $96 million since March 2013, making it likely that they will have spent double the previous record of $50.5 million set in 2010 between Quinn and GOP state Sen. Bill Brady.

Rauner raised $66 million, including nearly $27.6 million from his personal fortune made as a Winnetka equity investor.

"This is one of the most important elections in Illinois history, and everybody's got to remember: Their vote matters," Rauner said on WGN-AM 720 before departing on a swing of Downstate cities. "I think this election is going to come down to a few thousand votes."

Later, during an outdoor rally in Springfield that used the statehouse as a backdrop, Rauner appeared with former Republican Gov. Jim Edgar in vowing to "bring the government back to the center of Illinois, where it deserves to be" and deliver it from the hands of the Democratic "Chicago political machine."

Edgar, who had supported a rival to Rauner in the GOP primary, told voters they had only two choices for governor Tuesday. He said Quinn "might be well-intended but has failed." Rauner, he said, "can help us restore confidence in Illinois."

Edgar did not mention the third candidate for governor on the ballot, Libertarian Chad Grimm, whose candidacy has Republicans worried that he could draw needed votes away from Rauner. At least one labor union favoring Quinn's re-election has spent money to push Grimm's campaign in an effort to depress conservative votes for Rauner.

Quinn also had an extensive statewide schedule that included some hand-shaking at the 95th Street Red Line CTA station on the Far South Side. Quinn, who took office in 2009 after the impeachment of the now-imprisoned Rod Blagojevich, has banked on support from African-Americans on the city's South and West sides.

"We're counting on you. We need you," Quinn told "L" commuters during a 45-minute stop. He later traveled to events in Rockford, Moline, Peoria, Savoy, Marion, East St. Louis and Springfield.

Voters also will be deciding a series of other statewide races and ballot questions:

•Democratic U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin is seeking a fourth term against Republican state Sen. Jim Oberweis of Sugar Grove, who is making his third bid for the U.S. Senate.

•Democratic Attorney General Lisa Madigan is seeking her fourth term, against Republican Paul Schimpf, an attorney from Downstate Waterloo. Democratic Secretary of State Jesse White is seeking a fifth term, against Mike Webster, a Republican from Willowbrook.

•Republican Comptroller Judy Baar Topinka is seeking a second term in that office and is being challenged by Democrat Sheila Simon, the state's current lieutenant governor.

•And in an open-seat contest for state treasurer, Republican state Rep. Tom Cross of Oswego is facing Democratic state Sen. Mike Frerichs of Champaign. Current Treasurer Dan Rutherford is vacating the office after an unsuccessful bid for the GOP governor's nomination.

•Voters statewide also will be deciding whether to ratify two proposed amendments to the Illinois Constitution. One proposal would give crime victims more rights, information and participation in cases against a perpetrator, while another would explicitly prohibit laws that would discriminate against voters' rights.

•Three nonbinding statewide proposals also are on the ballot. They are widely regarded as an effort to generate Democratic turnout. Voters are being asked if they support an increase in the state's $8.25-an-hour minimum wage to $10, a 3 percent tax on incomes of $1 million or more with added revenue dedicated to schools, and if employer prescription drug plans for employees should be mandated to cover birth control.